Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Can Mort Weisinger Be Redeemed asks Arlen Schumer
I have an answer for Arlen.
No.
Weisinger and those early folks at DC Comics were evil and deserved to die long before they did. It still wouldn't have made a difference to the nearly blind and destitute Siegel, but it might have made him feel better.
"They kept sucking him in with stock options?" For all the horrible things that this man did to the poor creative individuals that had to work under him? Don't tell me, "Well, that's just how the business was back then." Bull. You can still make some money and you don't have to destroy the lives of the people under you just because you can. I don't care how unhappy this man was, He took it out on everyone around him and made their lives hell.
Forget about all the little contributions that he might ahve made to our favorite little nostalgic power fantasies. Simply look at how far from being any sort of good person Weisinger was. Viscious, belittling, emasculating, career destroying, eviscerating. Think, instead of this: without him ruining all the good stories and art that could have been done for Superman, think of how much better those comics could have been.
Read Men of Tomorrow, read what the artists and writers under him had to suffer through. And you'll never feel sorry again for him dying at a mere 63. All that evil, rolled into one insufferable man. and all because those poor people had the dream to work on a four color fantasy. And there was nowhere for them to go. Pay attention artistic folk, this is what happens: they die rich and you don't. And they hardly ever get their comeuppance.
No.
Weisinger and those early folks at DC Comics were evil and deserved to die long before they did. It still wouldn't have made a difference to the nearly blind and destitute Siegel, but it might have made him feel better.
"They kept sucking him in with stock options?" For all the horrible things that this man did to the poor creative individuals that had to work under him? Don't tell me, "Well, that's just how the business was back then." Bull. You can still make some money and you don't have to destroy the lives of the people under you just because you can. I don't care how unhappy this man was, He took it out on everyone around him and made their lives hell.
Forget about all the little contributions that he might ahve made to our favorite little nostalgic power fantasies. Simply look at how far from being any sort of good person Weisinger was. Viscious, belittling, emasculating, career destroying, eviscerating. Think, instead of this: without him ruining all the good stories and art that could have been done for Superman, think of how much better those comics could have been.
Read Men of Tomorrow, read what the artists and writers under him had to suffer through. And you'll never feel sorry again for him dying at a mere 63. All that evil, rolled into one insufferable man. and all because those poor people had the dream to work on a four color fantasy. And there was nowhere for them to go. Pay attention artistic folk, this is what happens: they die rich and you don't. And they hardly ever get their comeuppance.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Tony Harris v. Cosplayers: Really?
There are rants and there are RANTS. This one falls into the catagory of "rants", but its funny and i like funny. Tony Harris, of Starman and Ex Machina fame, launced into a rant about cosplay girls on Facebook that Valerie Gallaher quotes in here article in The Beat. At the risk of being redundant, go read Tony's comments there and come on back if you wish.
You know, I blasted comic conventions in the 90's when it became popular for Playboy Playmates to come and sign centerfolds of themselves to the typical "Simpsons" comic conventions: fat unwashed men with no social skills and a distinct odor of permanent virginity about them, partly because i thought "that this is how low we've sunk?", partly because i thought that there is no way we can get girls and women in to comics if this is the environment that they have to come into", and partly because it simply didn't have anything to do with comics.
So now Tony is upset that we have hot, sexy cosplay girls. And while i'm not into cosplay, I just don't see how its a bad thing. Yes, some of them are serious comic geeks getting lots of attention playing their fave characters, and lots of others are just getting attention, but man, it just doesn't bother me. I don't care why they're there. I don't think you want to cosplay unless you want attention, unless you want someone to actually get your costume. (I saw one kid dressed as the gluttonous spirit from Miyazaki's Spirited Away and went over to tell him that i loved that he dressed up. His comment? "Finally someone gets it!!" so, yes, if that made his day, then great.) I've seen plenty of Power Girls and sexy Catwomen. Fine with me. Not because I like oogling sexy women in skin tight lycra and neoprene but because, well, they care enought to show up and get into the spirit of things.
I mean, c'mon, comics were dying in the 90's, and now we're pop culture, finally. Again. And women are part of the equation. Thank god. Now, Tony does way more cons than i do, and perhaps he has simply been put upon by too many women dressed up as sexy Catwomen or the Mist and he's totally over it. Perfectly legit. But for all the girls love this stuff, and want to dress the part: great, let them enjoy themselves however they want. I can't hate on anyone who has decided, for however many reasons, to show up in an intricately detailed costume. I'm just glad that they're there and into it. Not because i'm dying to see yet another "Slave Leia" but because that doesn't take away from my con experience.
Oh dear, its going viral. Can't Rob Liefeld do something now to take the heat off of Tony?
You know, I blasted comic conventions in the 90's when it became popular for Playboy Playmates to come and sign centerfolds of themselves to the typical "Simpsons" comic conventions: fat unwashed men with no social skills and a distinct odor of permanent virginity about them, partly because i thought "that this is how low we've sunk?", partly because i thought that there is no way we can get girls and women in to comics if this is the environment that they have to come into", and partly because it simply didn't have anything to do with comics.
So now Tony is upset that we have hot, sexy cosplay girls. And while i'm not into cosplay, I just don't see how its a bad thing. Yes, some of them are serious comic geeks getting lots of attention playing their fave characters, and lots of others are just getting attention, but man, it just doesn't bother me. I don't care why they're there. I don't think you want to cosplay unless you want attention, unless you want someone to actually get your costume. (I saw one kid dressed as the gluttonous spirit from Miyazaki's Spirited Away and went over to tell him that i loved that he dressed up. His comment? "Finally someone gets it!!" so, yes, if that made his day, then great.) I've seen plenty of Power Girls and sexy Catwomen. Fine with me. Not because I like oogling sexy women in skin tight lycra and neoprene but because, well, they care enought to show up and get into the spirit of things.
I mean, c'mon, comics were dying in the 90's, and now we're pop culture, finally. Again. And women are part of the equation. Thank god. Now, Tony does way more cons than i do, and perhaps he has simply been put upon by too many women dressed up as sexy Catwomen or the Mist and he's totally over it. Perfectly legit. But for all the girls love this stuff, and want to dress the part: great, let them enjoy themselves however they want. I can't hate on anyone who has decided, for however many reasons, to show up in an intricately detailed costume. I'm just glad that they're there and into it. Not because i'm dying to see yet another "Slave Leia" but because that doesn't take away from my con experience.
Oh dear, its going viral. Can't Rob Liefeld do something now to take the heat off of Tony?
Friday, November 02, 2012
Before Watchmen: Are we trolling or what?
Dollar Bill?!? We're going to get a comic on Dollar Bill?
If you don't remember him, you're not alone. If you do remember him, its because you've read Watchmen a million times and you remember that he was the laughing stock, the one panel joke about how not to dress for the part of being a superhero.
And now, as a late addition to the Before Watchmen line, we get Wein and Rude's Dollar Bill.
Sadly, reading this while reading "Marvel Comics: the Untold Story" dovetails with Heidi McDonald's older post about DC's treatment of Moore, and how utterly distasteful the fans are towards the greatest writing genius that comics has ever had.
I really hate to see all the top notch talent that has been working on the Before line. I don't even have to name the names, you all know exactly who is doing those books. I would just have killed to have had them all working on new, amazing projects rather than desperately trying to fill in the gaps on a comics that was systematically designed to have gaps in just the right places to make the meat of the story work along the way. Its sad. And as they have said, "Hate the game, not the playa."
Well, there has never been a bigger gap in the Game and Playas than there is right now. Comics are more name driven now than since the first wave of "big names" changed the how the marketing worked in the mid-80's. And never has the potential for new properties and publishers existed alongside Marvel and DC trying desperately to hold on to the properties they have, and to squeeze every ounce out of them.
It would be interesting if, when we looked back, this was one of the final straws that might have broken the back of creators being willing to have their work published under the old paradigm. Such superior "name' creators such as Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Grey are off doing their Creator Owned Heroes book, and are clearly busy creating more characters and ideas than just about anyone else right now. More innovation from that writing team alone than anything that we're seeing at Marvel and DC currently.
I like Len Wein, and I love Rude's artwork, just as i love Hughes and Jones, but i don't think that i need a Dollar Bill comic. I hope that the royalties are enough to help Steve out from his financial difficulties when they collect all this. But i wish that this industry was so... so different.
If you don't remember him, you're not alone. If you do remember him, its because you've read Watchmen a million times and you remember that he was the laughing stock, the one panel joke about how not to dress for the part of being a superhero.
And now, as a late addition to the Before Watchmen line, we get Wein and Rude's Dollar Bill.
Sadly, reading this while reading "Marvel Comics: the Untold Story" dovetails with Heidi McDonald's older post about DC's treatment of Moore, and how utterly distasteful the fans are towards the greatest writing genius that comics has ever had.
I really hate to see all the top notch talent that has been working on the Before line. I don't even have to name the names, you all know exactly who is doing those books. I would just have killed to have had them all working on new, amazing projects rather than desperately trying to fill in the gaps on a comics that was systematically designed to have gaps in just the right places to make the meat of the story work along the way. Its sad. And as they have said, "Hate the game, not the playa."
Well, there has never been a bigger gap in the Game and Playas than there is right now. Comics are more name driven now than since the first wave of "big names" changed the how the marketing worked in the mid-80's. And never has the potential for new properties and publishers existed alongside Marvel and DC trying desperately to hold on to the properties they have, and to squeeze every ounce out of them.
It would be interesting if, when we looked back, this was one of the final straws that might have broken the back of creators being willing to have their work published under the old paradigm. Such superior "name' creators such as Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Grey are off doing their Creator Owned Heroes book, and are clearly busy creating more characters and ideas than just about anyone else right now. More innovation from that writing team alone than anything that we're seeing at Marvel and DC currently.
I like Len Wein, and I love Rude's artwork, just as i love Hughes and Jones, but i don't think that i need a Dollar Bill comic. I hope that the royalties are enough to help Steve out from his financial difficulties when they collect all this. But i wish that this industry was so... so different.
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